Doped ceria interlayer fabricated by conventional wet ceramic process such as dip-coating often suffers from high resistance due to either low density or solid-state reaction with yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ) electrolyte in solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs). This work presents a new route to reduce the resistance by increasing the density while minimizing the solid-state reaction through impregnating samaria-doped ceria (SDC) nano-particles to porous SDC interlayer of anode-supported tubular SOFCs. Results show that impregnated fine structure can substantially reduce the ohmic resistance, from 0.140 to 0.087 Omega cm(2) at 750 degrees C, and consequently significantly improve the fuel cell performance, peak power density from 1.01 to 1.50 W cm(-2) at 750 degrees C. The significant improvements demonstrate that impregnation is an effective method to improve the interlayer performance. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.